i prefer V. to Gravity's Rainbow
The scene in V. where he envisions machine gunning people from behind the salad bar may be my favorite Pynchon moment.
― EZ Snappin, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:37 (fifteen years ago) link
I hated Moby Dick. In fact, I had a professor who basically told us it was ok to skip all the technical whaling parts because even he thought they were boring.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:39 (fifteen years ago) link
i actually really dug moby-dick. took a while, but i got into it enough that i thought all the whaling stuff was cool. it doesn't make my top tier just because it didn't grab me or shake me or otherwise compel me the way my real favorites did. but i understand its classic-ness.
― us_odd_bunny_lady (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:42 (fifteen years ago) link
i loved the technical whaling parts!
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:42 (fifteen years ago) link
I just couldn't do it. I have this unfortunate thing where if a book doesn't really grab me within a couple days of reading then I'm likely to abandon it. I can't force myself to read something that I'm just not enjoying. That happened to me with M Dick.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:44 (fifteen years ago) link
I didn't finish The Confidence Man, but it was weird feeling all of these undercurrents of Melville's symbolism coming to life, instead of just being something you write a hackneyed term paper about. It's sort of like seeing a ghost.
― bamcquern, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:44 (fifteen years ago) link
winter's tale, mark helprin -- here's one that is on my all-time list because of how much i loved it as a teenager, but when i reread it some years later all of its overblown romantic flaws were much more evident. still, some great stuff in it. (my appreciation for it has been further dimmed by helprin's increasingly vocal right-wing curmudgeonliness over the years.)
and in the i guess you'd say non-literary realm, the original four books in gene wolfe's book of the new sun series, and the original three earthsea books are probably at the top. (ok, along with LOTR and watership down, if we're counting their impact on a 12-year-old.)
― us_odd_bunny_lady (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:48 (fifteen years ago) link
That happened to me with M Dick
it was one that i started twice. the first time i stalled out around page 60. i came back about 6 months later and for whatever reason it clicked.
― us_odd_bunny_lady (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:50 (fifteen years ago) link
narrowing to five is tough.
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:51 (fifteen years ago) link
OK one of my other favorite books is The Fermata by Nicholson Baker which is basically about sex with a little math thrown in.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:51 (fifteen years ago) link
x-post
That's why I've ended up with 10 or maybe even 11 now!
my glib take on moby dick is that it's a boy book because of the whole boys and boats thing, and it kind of is, especially in the sense that melville novels are the some of the gayest books i've ever read, but it wasn't really a boy book in the way i thought it was going to be.
― horseshoe, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:54 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah you might be on to something. I was just so bored reading it.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:55 (fifteen years ago) link
it's a crazy book. i would never call it a favorite but i took a reading course where we basically read everything melville ever wrote and i kind of have to love him forever now. he was such a nut.
― horseshoe, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:57 (fifteen years ago) link
OTM, it's gay and butch at the same time. xposts
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:57 (fifteen years ago) link
huh
Finley Wren - Philip WyliePale Fire - NabakovInfinite Jest - DFWSula - Toni MorrisonGod Bless You Mr. Rosewater - Vonnegut
― meh (jjjusten), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 02:58 (fifteen years ago) link
maybe
I started this thread to jump start my interest in reading fiction again. After reading so much non-fiction for school I sort of abandoned novels and realized recently that I really miss reading for fun so I thought remembering my favorites might be a good way of rekindling my interest and it has!
Also seeing everyone else's posts I keep thinking of others that I could easily have placed on my list. It's also fascinating to see what overlaps between posters.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:01 (fifteen years ago) link
People really seem to love some Pale Fire and with good reason!
i've read that and vox -- was a little shamefaced to check both of them out of the library -- but my favorite n.baker is the mezzanine.
― us_odd_bunny_lady (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:04 (fifteen years ago) link
I also read Vox which I enjoyed but not as much as The Fermata. I will check out The Mezzanine.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:06 (fifteen years ago) link
it's more about shoelaces and automatic hand-dryers than sex, but still good.
― us_odd_bunny_lady (tipsy mothra), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:07 (fifteen years ago) link
btw - I was pretty young/naive when I read The Fermata and pretty much looked like this the whole time I was reading it O_O.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:08 (fifteen years ago) link
Dance to the Music of Time -- entertaining, but a disappointment, esp. the volumes dealing with the war
Agreed - I read Pat Barker's Regeneration trilogy soon after DttMoT, and it blew Powell out of the water. A different war of course, but she captured it so much more personally.
Halldor Laxman's Independent People goes on my list, possibly bumping off Snowcrash
One thing that really got me about Moby Dick - I didn't expect it to be so funny, and the first chapters had some genuinely funny stuff which drew me right in.
― Jaq, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:11 (fifteen years ago) link
Hang on a second - Halldor Laxman's Independent People - That's the Icelandic one about . . . sheep! Right?? I could hardly get through any of it. I know it's supposed to be excellent but I just felt like nothing happened.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:12 (fifteen years ago) link
laxness! i am working on that. but i got stopped. i think it's really great, i don't know why i can't finish books anymore. probably internet.
― harbl, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:14 (fifteen years ago) link
Maybe I didn't give it enough time. It was just very . . . slow. Also, long.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:15 (fifteen years ago) link
Well, there's sheep in it, but mostly it's about a very very stubborn guy who alienates his children (his wives all die from his pig-headed cruelty) and falls victim to his own pride when he decides to build a concrete house.
― Jaq, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:15 (fifteen years ago) link
i can't finish books lately either. i will also blame the internet.
― horseshoe, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:16 (fifteen years ago) link
it's my excuse too.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:16 (fifteen years ago) link
powers, the gold bug variationsdfw, infinite jestcamus, the plague
― mookieproof, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:16 (fifteen years ago) link
it is super slow but in parts i was just like...wow. i think i was about halfway. xp
― harbl, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:16 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah i've tried independent people twice and failed, but i suck at reading these days
― mookieproof, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:17 (fifteen years ago) link
gold bug variations is a great book! every time i think about rereading it i get sad, though.
― horseshoe, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:18 (fifteen years ago) link
powers, the gold bug variations
This one stalled me out and is staring at me accusatorily from the shelf over my right shoulder as I type.
― Jaq, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:18 (fifteen years ago) link
i am reading 3 books now :(last time i read any of independent people was in april. i can't finish a book unless i can do it in under 2 weeks, basically
― harbl, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:18 (fifteen years ago) link
hah Jaq, that actually happened to me the first time i tried to read it, too.
xpost
― horseshoe, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:19 (fifteen years ago) link
ok, five:
Ulysses - James JoyceWar and peace - Leo TolstoyOne Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia MarquezThe Red and the Black - StendhalJourney to the Centre of the Earth - Jules Verne
while reading each of the above i thought "this is the greatest novel i ever read".
In a top ten, I would include Moby Dick, The Sound and the Fury, Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter (Vargas Llosa), and either All the Names (Saramago), Huckleberry Finn, or Don Quixote.
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:20 (fifteen years ago) link
Don Quixote is another I couldn't finish tbh.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:21 (fifteen years ago) link
this is a question i can never answer + it makes me anxious to contemplate but the truest response would probably be any five austen novels that aren't sense and sensibility, i.e. the answer i would have given when i was sixteen. :-/
― horseshoe, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:22 (fifteen years ago) link
i can finish a book if it's good
if i can't, it's a Bad Book and i will hurl it at the floor w/disgust
xp i was about to mention don quixote (BAD BOOK)
― (╬ ಠ益ಠ) (cankles), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:22 (fifteen years ago) link
don qui-so-gay
― (╬ ಠ益ಠ) (cankles), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:23 (fifteen years ago) link
a little trick: you don't need to.
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:24 (fifteen years ago) link
x-posts LOL
Yeah, I get so frustrated when I can't finish them. I feel guilty like it's my fault or something because they're supposedly good books. From now on I'm with you, it's the bad books' fault - not mine.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:24 (fifteen years ago) link
a book like quixote i think is esp ok to sample liberally... it's a big, unwieldy and not-all-that-tightly-structured thing...not at all a standard novel format.
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:27 (fifteen years ago) link
i don't have much patience for a book that bores me. it's why i never made it past the rivendell section of lord of the rings.
i pick books in the bookstore by the first paragraph. if that grabs me, i'm in. otherwise, nah.
― collardio gelatinous, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:30 (fifteen years ago) link
Sometimes if I know that I'm not in for long haul SERIOUS novel reading I turn to things like this:
http://www.cryptomundo.com/wp-content/uploads/mewritebook.jpg
Which btw is great.
― ☺☻☺☻come on ppl now smile on u brother☺☻☺☻ (ENBB), Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:32 (fifteen years ago) link
Two books I enjoyed the hell out of and would put on my list but haven't finished (but will)
Don QuixoteTristram Shandy
Reading and enjoying reading is about routine and partly about a little enforced isolation.
Plus I think it is easier to learn what is true from fiction.
― bamcquern, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:43 (fifteen years ago) link
And I think what is boring in a book changes and diminishes as you work those reading muscles.
And the above two I mentioned are not chores to read (certainly not DQ, as some have suggested).
― bamcquern, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:44 (fifteen years ago) link
its kind of tempting here to right a lot 2 justify my love but i will just right a list instead
01 nabokov lolita02 davies deptford trilogy03 price clockers 04 bolano savage detectives05 aciman call me by your name 06 mahfouz cairo trilogy 07 mccullers heart is a lonely hunter08 nabokov speak, memory09 solzhenitsyn cancer ward 10 le guin earthsea
― Lamp, Wednesday, 24 June 2009 03:50 (fifteen years ago) link